Wildlife DNA Forensic in Curbing Illegal Wildlife Trade: Specie Identification from Seizures

Species identification in wildlife forensics is the one of the major concern to enforce law and curbing illegal wildlife trade. Among all the available analytical teqniques DNA based species identification is the most robust and acceptable evidence in the court of law. We analysed cytochrome b and 12S rRNA mtDNA fragments to identify species from three different seizures. DNA based analysis of Cyt b and 12S rRNA has identified three seizures as Hog deer, Chital and Swamp deer

Flow chart of process employed for the current study.

<p>Flow chart of process employed for the current study.</p

Location of 25 study sites and four physiographic and prey type zones for snow leopard conservation.

<p>(Reproduced from IUCN 2012. <i>IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. </i><i>Version 2012.1</i>. <a href="http://www.iucnredlist.org" target="_blank">http://www.iucnredlist.org</a>. Downloaded on 22-02-2013).</p

Sites and source of data used for this study.

<p>25 studies were referred spanning four zones in the snow leopard's distribution <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0088349#pone.0088349-Anwar1" target="_blank">[18]</a>, <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0088349#pone.0088349-Maheshwari1" target="_blank">[ 54]</a>–<a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0088349#pone.0088349-Lhagvasuren1" target="_blank">[63]</a>.</p

Prey preferences of taxonomic groups of snow leopard prey items.

<p>Black illustrates significantly preferred prey, open bars represent species killed in proportion to their availability and stippled bars (or no bar) indicate significantly avoided prey species.</p

Diet diversity in different zones.

<p>Cumulative observations of FOO of prey in scats were used from each zone. Diet diversity is represented by Shannon index.</p

Mean Jacobs' index values (±1 S.E.) for prey species of the snow leopard at two or more sites.

<p>Black illustrates significantly preferred prey, open bars represent species killed in proportion to their availability and stippled bars (or no bar) indicate significantly avoided prey species. As described in the text, we analysed the data of Siberian ibex and blue sheep twice to remove one outlying result for each.</p

Zonation dividing the four zones using Yule ‘Y’ colligation co-efficient.

<p>Bases on potential prey available in study areas of referred. Clusters formed in to 4 zones based on potential prey (1-0 matrix) available in the study site. Nearest linkage are close to 0 farthest are towards 25. On average groups were at 25 and 20 (Zone 1), 9 (Zone 3), 23, 17 (Zone 2), 8 and 1 (Zone 4). Zone 4 separated out as a sub cluster but due to it's physiographical nature this zone is treated as distinct.</p

Prey weight and relative occurrence of prey in snow leopard scat.

<p>Prey weights used were ¾ the body mass of average adult female of each prey species. Double hump indicates that snow leopard feeds primarily on large prey but may shift to small-bodied prey sub-optimally.</p

Segmented model of the relationship between the mass-rank of each prey species and the corresponding cumulative Jacobs' Index +1 value for snow leopard.

<p>Actual prey species' masses, which correspond to the lowest, break-point, and highest prey mass-ranks are indicated.</p